The regime is working hard to keep the news about the protest movment in Iran from being reported.

From jamming satellite broadcasts, to prohibiting news reporters from covering any demonstrations to shutting down all cell phones and even hiring foreign security to control the population, the regime is doing everything in its power to keep the popular movement from expressing its demand for an end of the regime.

These efforts by the regime, while successful in the short term, do not resolve the fundamental reasons why this regime is crumbling from within.

Iran is a country ready for a regime change. If you follow this thread you will witness, I believe, the transformation of a nation. This daily thread provides a central place where those interested in the events in Iran can find the best news and commentary.

Please continue to join us here, post your news stories and comments to this thread.

Islamic Human Rights Commission voices concern over status of a number of inmates in Iran

Payvand's Iran News ... 10/5/03

Secretary of Islamic Human Rights Commission (IHRC) Mohammad Hassan Ziaiefar on Saturday expressed concern over the status of a number of inmates such as Mohammad Mohsen Sazegara and Abbas Abdi, IRNA reported from Tehran.

According to the Public Relations Department of IHRC, Ziaiefar made the remarks in a meeting with members of groups supporting human rights in Iran.

Highlighting Iran's domestic and international situation, he said it was expected that all human rights advocates nationwide insist on observation of the rights of all citizens in the society such as political activists.

On the case of late Iranian photojournalist Zahra Kazemi, he said the Islamic Human Rights Commission has pursued the case from the earliest stages and there is no doubt that the representative of the Commission will attend the court proceedings. ....

I have no respect for the hereditary principle and neither does Shiite Islam, which considers earthly kingship to be profane. But no one can be completely uninterested in heredity per se, and my first thought, on meeting Hossein Khomeini, was that he has his grandfather's eyebrows. Still, our conversation quickly banished the notion that this 45-year-old cleric is the least bit interested in running for his grandpa's job.

He is a relatively junior cleric  a sayeed  but he wears the turban and robe with some aplomb and was until recently a resident of Qum, the holy city of the Iranian Shiites and once the Vatican, so to speak, of the Khomeini theocracy. As soon as it became feasible, however, he moved to Baghdad (where he would have been executed on sight until a few months ago) and is now hoping to establish himself in Karbala, one of the two holy Shiite cities in southern Iraq. He refers as a matter of course to the work of the coalition forces in Iraq as a "liberation." He would prefer, he says, to live in Tehran, but he cannot consider doing so until there has been "liberation" in Iran also.

He speaks perfect Arabic, acquired during the years when the ayatollah and his family were exiled by the shah to live in Karbala, and he knows Iraq reasonably well already. He is of course a figure of fascination to the Iraqi Shiite population, but he doesn't seek any explicit role in their affairs. Nonetheless, his view of developments among them is worth hearing. "Talk of an Islamic state in Iraq is not very serious or very deeply rooted among the people. It is necessary for religion and politics to be separated." When I asked him about Moqtada al-Sadr, the Shiite anti-American extremist in Iraq who is the son of the late Ayatollah Sadr, murdered by Saddam Hussein, he was dismissive. "He is not considered an interpreter of our religion but only an imitator known only because of his father." Again, there is implicit disapproval of those who trade on the family name.

Even so, I could not resist asking his opinion of the famous fatwa against Salman Rushdie. I cannot say that I understood all of his reply, which was very long and detailed and contained some Quranic references and citations that were (to me at any rate) rather abstruse. But the meaning was very plain. A sentence of death for apostasy cannot really be pronounced, or acted upon, unless there is "an infallible imam," and there is no such thing. The Shiite faithful believe in a "hidden imam" who may one day be restored to them, but they have learned to be wary of impostors or false prophets. In any event, added Khomeini, there was an important distinction between what the Quran said and what an ayatollah as head of state might say. "We cannot nowadays have executions in this form." Indeed, he added, it was the policy of executions that had turned the Islamic revolution in Iran sour in the first place. "Now we have had 25 years of a failed Islamic revolution in Iran, and the people do not want an Islamic regime anymore."

It's not strictly necessary to speak to Hossein Khomeini to appreciate the latter point: Every visitor to Iran confirms it, and a large majority of the Iranians themselves have voted for anti-theocratic candidates. The entrenched and reactionary regime can negate these results up to a certain point; the only question is how long can they do so? Young Khomeini is convinced that the coming upheaval will depend principally on those who once supported his grandfather and have now become disillusioned. I asked him what he would like to see happen, and his reply this time was very terse and did not require any Quranic scriptural authority or explication. The best outcome, he thought, would be a very swift and immediate American invasion of Iran.

It hurt me somewhat to have to tell him that there was scant chance of deliverance coming by this means. He took the news pretty stoically (and I hardly think I was telling him anything he did not know). But I was thinking, wow, this is what happens if you live long enough. You'll hear the ayatollah's grandson saying, not even "Send in the Marines" but "Bring in the 82nd Airborne." I think it was the matter-of-factness of the reply that impressed me the most: He spoke as if talking of the obvious and the uncontroversial.

That reminded me to ask him what he thought of the mullahs' nuclear program. He calmly said that there was no physical force that was stronger than his faith, and thus there was no need for any country to arm itself in this way. No serious or principled Shiite had any fear of his belief being destroyed by any kind of violence. It was not a matter for the state, and the state and religion (he reiterated) ought to be separatedfor both their sakes.

Hossein Khomeini operates within an entirely Quranic frame of reference, but what he has to say is obviously of great interest to those who take the secular "regime change" position. The arguments about genocide, terrorism, and WMDin all of which I believe the Bush administration had (and has) considerable right on its sideare all essentially secondary to the overarching question: Does there exist in the Middle East a real constituency for pluralism and against theocracy and dictatorship. And can the exercise of outside force hope to release and encourage these elements? This is a historic question in the strict sense, because we will not know the true answer for some considerable time. But that does not deprive us of some responsibility to make judgments in the meanwhile, and we have good reason to know that the region can't be left to fester as it is. On my own recent visit to Baghdad, Karbala, and Najaf, as well as to Basra and then Kurdistan, I would say that I saw persuasive evidence of the unleashing of real politics in Iraq and of the highly positive effect of same. Conversation with Khomeini suggests to me that in at least one other highly important neighboring country, the United States has also managed to get on the right side of history, as we used to say.

"We hope to announce the outcome for the field within the first half of the next Iranian year, beginning in March 2004 - I mean in spring or summer," he told reporters who had travelled down to the Gulf for the inauguration of a new phase of oil projects.

He added broad international competition had entered the race for the massive Azadegan oilfield in western Iran after a Japanese consortium lost exclusive rights.

"French, Dutch, Norwegian, Chinese and Indian companies have been invited for the development of the Azadegan oilfield," he said.

The government-backed Japanese consortium missed a June deadline to seal the $2 billion deal, following pressure from the United States to back away.

Mirmoezi gave his appraisal of other so-called "buy-back" deals with foreign companies seeking to develop Iran's virgin oilfields.

On the development of the Bangestan field, he said two companies, which he declined to name, had reached the final stretch of the race and he hoped to announce a winner by March 2004.

Oil Minister Bijan Zanganeh has already said the shortlisted companies are Britain's BP and France's Total.

Spokespeople from Royal Dutch/Shell said on Monday the Anglo-Dutch oil giant was aiming to meet a target of 190,000 barrels per day (bpd) from Iran's offshore Gulf fields by March.

A spokesman for Shell said output from the Nowruz oilfield, which has not yet started production, would hit 90,000 bpd by the beginning of the Iranian year on March 20 while the Soroush field should be pumping 100,000 bpd by then.

Mirmoezi said the final stages of negotiations for the oil layer of the South Pars field were throwing up thorny problems that meant the state National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC) could take the project on themselves.

"Particular difficulties have stretched out negotiations. We need to resolve some ambiguities," Mirmoezi told reporters.

"We are doing our best to conclude negotiations but NIOC may undertake the development of the oil layer of South Pars if they do not have the desired result," he added.

More teachers have been arrested following their strikes and protest gatherings of yesterday. Several of the arrests have occured yesterday evening and in the early hours of today, following the protest gatherings in front of the offices of the Ministry of Education.

The new arrests have occured in the cities of Abadan, Shiraz, Mashad, Ardabil and Oroomiah (former Rezai-e) as they were shouting slogans against the regime and its leaders. Many others were arrested, yesterday, in the cities of Tehran, Esfahan, Hamadan and Kermanshah during the attacks of the plainclothes men.

Iran says it is giving international inspectors lists of equipment it bought outside the country for its uranium enrichment program. A top official in Tehran said the government agreed to turn over the lists as part of an effort to comply with international demands for more information on the Iranian nuclear program.

Inspectors from the International Atomic Energy Agency discovered traces of highly enriched uranium earlier this year at two locations in Iran. The highly enriched material can be used for nuclear weapons.

Iran said the material must have been on equipment when it was brought into the country for a nuclear program that the Tehran government insists is only designed to produce electricity.

Iran has never officially said where it bought the equipment for centrifuges to enrich uranium, but it has been reported that the gear originated in Pakistan and was sold on the black market.

A delegation from the IAEA traveled to Iran last week to seek more information about the nuclear program. Last month, the IAEA board gave Iran until the end of October to show that it is not developing nuclear weapons under the cover of a civilian power program.

TEHRAN: An International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) team has begun a crucial round of inspections in Iran after reaching an accord with Iranian officials on a list of sites to visit, a top Iranian diplomat said on Monday.

And in a further sign that Iran was working to comply with an IAEA ultimatum over its suspect nuclear programme, Irans representative to the IAEA Ali Akbar Salehi also said the Islamic republic had begun divulging details of its nuclear equipment imports.

The experts from the IAEA presented us a list of sites, and we arrived at a bilateral agreement on the sites the inspectors wished to visit, Salehi, said. The inspections have now begun.

Salahi did not say whether or not Iran had agreed to open up for visits all of the sites. AFP

Mr. Mohsen Sazegara, a prominent dissident politician and journalist known for his outspoken criticism of the Islamic Republic's clerical leaders was released on bail on Monday after four months in jail, the British news agency Reuters quoted his brother as having announced.

A co-founder of a new political party with Mr. Qasem Sho´leh Sa´di and some other new reformers who call for radical change in Iranian Constitution, Mr. Sazgara, a one-time press aide to the leader of Iran's 1979 Islamic revolution Grand Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, was freed after his family paid the equivalent of $750,000 bail.

Sazgara, who has been editor of several liberal newspapers and news Web sites closed down by the hardline judiciary in the past four years, was arrested in June, charged with provoking student protests that shook Tehran and several other Iranian cities in June and July, his lawyer told the official IRNA news agency.

Rumours had been flying in recent days about Sazgara's deteriorating health, prompting the judiciary to take the unusual step of denying that he had died while in custody and assuring that he was well, both physically and mentally, detained with other (political) prisoners.

''He has lost around 20 kg (44 pounds) and we will take him to hospital for a general check-up tonight or tomorrow morning,'' his brother Mehdi Sazgara told Reuters.

''He was imprisoned for almost 113 days but he spent 79 days in solitary confinement'', he added, as other informed Iranian opposition sources outside Iran speculated that the regime had itself exagerated the news about its row with the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency to better crackdown influential political dissidents.

While the whole world seems to be preoccupied with Iran´s nuclear programs, it pays little attention to the worsening human rights situation in Iran and particularly that of political prisoners, Mr.Javad Sho´leh Sa´di, the youngest son of the lawyer and university rofessor who told Iran Press Service.

Dr. Sho´leh Sa´di was detained last August and suffered torture while in prison, charged with having questionned openly the leader´s religious credentials and his domestic and foreign policies, mostly his defiant opposition to dialogue with the United States.

Besides Mr. Sazegara, several other prominent Iranian journalists, namely Mr. Abbas Abdi, Akbar Ganji, Hoda Saber, Reza Alijani and Taqi Rahmani, to name some, are in jail, with their families and lawyers unable to reach them.

In a recent letter to the authorities, families of the jailed intellectuals have warned that if they continue not releasing any sound information about the status of their relatives, they would have no other choice but to get help from the international community.

Paris-based media rights watchdog Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on Friday called on Iranian authorities to give immediate news and guarantees about the health of Sazgara who has heart problems, and other jailed dissidents.

According to RSF Iran is the biggest jail for journalists in the Middle East with 17 journalists in prison and its leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenehí, one of the world´s predators of journalists asnd press freedom. ENDS SAZEGARA RELEASED 71003

"Iran's most advanced intermediate ballistic missile is controlled not by their standing armed forces, but by the Republican Guard. So there's a potential for groups like Hezbollah to be fueled with very sophisticated weaponry. I would think this would be keeping people up nights in Washington."

You would think so..........

Great post, Doctor. Thanks.

31
posted on 10/06/2003 7:58:35 PM PDT
by nuconvert
( Stop thinking about it and do it.)

"We never asked Russia to not build the plant at Bushehr," Secretary of State Colin Powell said last month. That's strange. When I was in the Clinton administration, we told the Russians, and more than once, not to build that nuclear power plant in Iran. When they persisted, we pushed them to narrow the scope of their cooperation. In this we succeeded.

At the United States' urging, the Russians insisted that the Iranians purchase the nuclear fuel from Russian companies and return the spent fuel to Russia for disposal. Now Russia has almost finished building a reactor at Bushehr, but because of the spent-fuel arrangement the Iranians will not be able to get material for nuclear weapons from it.

That means the Bushehr reactor is not a proliferation problem on par with the plant at Natanz, which Iran built secretly. This plant, not Bushehr, is the main problem for the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Still, Bushehr continues to be at the core of American differences with Russia over Iran. The Russians insist that they should be able to build even more reactors at Bushehr; so long as they provide fuel and carry away the spent fuel, the Russians say, there will be no danger of it being used for weapons. The Americans counter that building more reactors in Iran creates a greater potential for a weapons program.

The result is an impasse. The United States insists that Russia cease construction at Bushehr and will not move forward on other issues until Russia agrees. Impossible, say the Russians, citing the loss of a contract worth hundreds of millions of dollars.

This stalemate has prevented Moscow and Washington from working together on projects that could curtail proliferation. An example of how beneficial Russian-American cooperation could be is the Russian proposal to build an international spent-fuel storage site in the city of Krasnoyarsk in western Siberia. Utilities from around the world could send their spent nuclear fuel to Krasnoyarsk. The utilities would pay a fee for the storage; part of that money could be used to help pay for the protection of Russian nuclear facilities against theft and accident.

The project would also be a valuable tool in helping to solve crises in places other than Iran. If the Krasnoyarsk site were available, for example, Russia would be able to take the 8,000 fuel rods that the North Koreans have been using to extract plutonium for nuclear weapons and store them in a safe place.

The United States, however, is refusing to talk to Russia about any site for spent fuel, in Krasnoyarsk or elsewhere, until American concerns about the Bushehr reactor are resolved. This is counterproductive. The contours of a deal are not difficult to imagine:

Russia might agree, for the time being, to limit the project at Bushehr to a single reactor, and link continuing cooperation to Iran's willingness to work with the International Atomic Energy Agency. In particular, Iran needs to clear up questions about its nuclear program by the agency's Oct. 31 deadline. The agency's demand for additional safeguards is another necessary step, but the United States and Russia could cooperate in other areas, like monitoring the fuel services deal.

The United States, for its part, would agree that Russia has taken sufficient action to resolve concerns over the Bushehr reactor, and would move quickly to resume cooperation with Russia on nuclear issues. An international spent-fuel storage facility, like the one proposed for Krasnoyarsk, should be the first item on that agenda.

If the United States and Russia begin to work together, we could see some progress on proliferation. With nuclear crises on two continents, the United States needs every tool it can get, and it needs the cooperation of Moscow.

Rose Gottemoeller, a senior associate at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, was responsible for nonproliferation policy at the Department of Energy from 1997 to 2000.

Tehran, Oct 6 - Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Seyed Ali Khamenei said on Monday that the Islamic Republic is dependent upon the faith, awareness and determination of the people.

In a meeting with the Friday Prayers leaders from across the country, the Supreme Leader said that all the governing bodies are expected to encourage the people to bolster their faith, insight, happiness and spirit.

The Supreme Leader said that every individual has effective role in protecting the Islamic Republic and advised the Friday Prayers leaders to preach the people about the reality and enlightening them to strengthen their resolve and religious beliefs.

The Supreme Leader said that the Friday Prayers congregationis the influential and extensive venue to discuss the needs of the time and that competent prayers leaders have turned the congregation to a media to address every aspect of the community life.

The Supreme Leader said that the Islamic Republic gives importance to the guidance of the Islamic nations and appreciates the resurrection of the Muslim world thanks to the triumph of the Islamic Revolution in Iran (in 1979).

"Though the propaganda machine of the arrogant powers and the Zionists have campaigned to prevent nations from knowing the realities in Iran, but, the fact is that the Islamic Republic has turned to a source of hope and spiritual support for the Muslims cross the globe."

The Supreme Leader said that the Iraqi people both Shia or Sunni have shown their commitment to Islam and that the masses in all Muslim states call for sovereignty of Islam and they take every opportunity to voice the call.

"The arrogant powers resorted to every conspiracy to undermine the Islamic Republic.

They encouraged Saddam Hussein to attack Iran and embarked on waves of terrorist operations to assassinate prominent religious or political leaders.

But, the Islamic Republic succeeded in safeguarding independence of the country, establishing freedom of expression, administering the country by holding democratic elections and making great achievements," the Supreme Leader said.

The Supreme Leader said that the scientific progress and gaining access to nuclear technology are examples of Iranian nation's innate talents.

"The arrogant powers well know that Iran doesn't have nuclear arms.

They are anxious about Iran's acquisition of the nuclear technology, because they know that it will help Iran achieve industrial progress.

They don't want Iran to attain industrial and economic development while the country seeks justice and freedom in the international community," the Supreme Leader said.

Prior to the Supreme Leader's remarks, Friday Prayer Leader Ayatollah Ali Meshkini said that the Friday Prayers leaders are the teachers of ethics who shoulder heavy burden, so they should respect piety and sincerity.

(( Yes, lol... They don't want Iran to attain industrial and economic development while the country seeks justice and freedom in the international community," the Supreme Leader said. Who are you talking to, Mr. Leader? some Kids? Wake Up! ))

VIENNA, Austria (Reuters) - U.N. experts say that if Iran has an atomic weapons program they will find evidence of it as they arrive Friday from Vienna for a month of intense inspections.

Technical experts from the Vienna-based International Atomic Energy Agency flew into Iran ahead of an Oct. 31 deadline to prove the country has no secret atomic bomb program. Washington alleges that it does while Tehran says it does not.

The agency has had success before. Before 1991, the IAEA discovered and dismantled Iraq's bomb program.

An A-bomb maker still needs 45 to 65 pounds of arms-grade uranium or plutonium to build a bomb. This leaves a highly detectable trail, says the IAEA, which says it can detect atomic particles down to a single picogram -- one trillionth of a gram.

"If you handle weapons-grade materials, trace amounts get out," said Therese Renis, a technical specialist at the IAEA.

She compared the agency's ability to find nuclear traces to finding one among thousands of marbles spread across a square mile in the center of the Austrian capital.

Some of the technology IAEA inspectors use to find sub-microscopic traces of fissile uranium and plutonium appears deceptively simple at first glance. The most important tool is a cotton swab used for environmental sampling.

Inspectors are especially interested in swiping areas around ventilation systems, light fixtures and the tops of shelves, said David Donohue, head of the IAEA's Clean Laboratory Unit.

"Wherever people don't usually dust," he explained.

CONTAMINATION EXPLANATION IN VOGUE

Such inspections have already yielded suspicious results in Iran -- traces of arms-grade highly-enriched uranium at two nuclear sites. This has fueled suspicions that Tehran has been secretly purifying uranium for use in a bomb, which Iran denies.

The Iranians say the uranium came from contaminated machinery purchased abroad. But this explanation has met with widespread skepticism.

IAEA experts say Iran is not the first country to claim that the discovery of arms-grade material is due to contamination.

"It's in vogue," Renis said about the contamination explanation. "It used to be: 'your results are bad'."

Asked how many contamination claims have been confirmed, Renis said: "More have been disproved than proved."

After arriving at the IAEA labs in Seibersdorf, Austria -- a half-hour from Vienna -- the samples on the swabs taken at nuclear facilities in Iran or elsewhere are analyzed.

Great care is taken to prevent contamination of the swabs before and after they have been used to swipe a location. Six identical swipes are taken at each site and each is double-bagged and sealed to prevent cross-contamination.

Of the six swipes, several are analyzed, several archived and several sent to some of the IAEA's network of 14 labs around the world to ensure consistency.

If IAEA chief Mohamed ElBaradei decides to inform the agency's governing board about a finding by his inspectors -- as happened with the discoveries in Iran -- the results have been checked so many times that they are virtually unassailable.

"We have to have a high degree of confidence in our data to go that far," said senior IAEA safeguards analyst, Diane Fischer. "We want strong, conclusive evidence."

Tehran, Oct 6, IRNA -- Minister of Defense Rear-Admiral Ali Shamkhani on Monday sent a message to his Syrian counterpart condemning the Zionist regime`s air raid on Syria. In a message to Syrian Defense Minister Major General Mustafa Tlass, Shamkhani said that Israel dared to commit the imprudent action in light of the support it enjoys from the western countries and the double standard they employ in the international campaign against terrorism. Syria urged the United States not to block a UN Security Council resolution condemning Israeli air raid, saying Washington should help prevent escalation of tensions in the Middle East. Washington said in the urgent meeting of the Security Council that adopting the resolution had to go to the capitals of the council members for study.

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